The Contribution of Math to Roller Coasters

By Stefan Robert

The contribution of math to roller coasters involves the speeds and angles of the tracks and the cars. Find out about the contribution of math to roller coasters with help from an expert in computers, with two degrees in both Computer Science and Applied Mathematics, in this free video clip.

Transcript

Hi, my name is Stefan. Today, I'm going to be speaking on the contribution of math to roller coasters. Now every roller coaster has the big loopty loop in it that makes the roller coaster very fun. It goes around. Now in this loopty loop when we're going in a circle, we know that force is equivalent to mass times the velocity squared over R, R being the radius. Now because of this formula we can control the force just by increasing and decreasing the radius. So when R increases and R is big, force is down. When R is small, the force goes up. And that's the contribution of mathematics to roller coasters.